I think it was Bill Hybels who said that “The Church is still the hope of the world”–not in a means unto itself, but as the messenger and conduit in which God uses it to reach out to those outside the faith and bring them into communion with Himself and with His people. Late Saturday my friend and client, Sal Sberna sent me a picture of his Easter service rehearsal. He gave me a challenge: why not text some of your clients and ask them to send you phone pics of their Easter services and share them with your team on Monday? As the pictures and reports of what God had done in many of these services came through my phone on Sunday, I felt compelled to share them not only with my team but with you as well. These pictures reflect literally hundreds of thousands of people who attended…

Yesterday was an interesting day. I spent most of it carrying a mannequin around downtown Nashville in sub freezing temperatures. I carried “Pat,” our androgynous articulated dummy, through busy streets for a video shoot. For this piece, we placed Pat strategically around crowds, street corners and traffic and filmed “life” happening around a stiff, gray representation of a man (even though Pat is technically a woman dummy dressed like a man, but I digress). While I knew people might find the whole scene curious, I didn’t expect it to open the doors for a faith conversation. Periodically throughout the day someone would approach me and asked what we were doing. “Do you ever feel like life is passing you by and you’re paralyzed or stuck? People come and go but you’re not moving?” Most just shook their heads in agreement. “This mannequin represents us when we feel stuck and in…

“I like you. How can we work together?” I remember hearing that from a person who barely knew me at the time and today is a client, and, more importantly, a friend. We all buy services and products, but we often buy them from some one, and the nature of sales has more to do with the salesperson than it does with the buyer. Great salespeople can sell most anything. In my experience, people want to buy from those whom they like. All things being equal, I want to buy from someone I relate to and trust. I might even be willing to pay a premium for good service and a smile. Just ask the girl at the sun glass store where I bought a new pair of expensive glasses after she convinced me it made me look younger. (Ok, I was grasping for a reason and the phrase “they…

I chose “Making a Difference” for my blog title years ago because when I started The A Group, my intent was to help churches, ministries and businesses to make a difference in the lives of people in their communities and around the globe. And we have. Over the past 9 years we have helped our clients to become better and more effective at what they do. Last week I was reminded again that we are still making a difference. Pastor Bruce Frank of Biltmore Baptist Church in Asheville, NC, spoke to the Groupers (that’s what we call anyone on the The A Group team) on Friday about the impact our Easter marketing had on his church. We often hear of the percentage of increase in attendance during our media campaigns, total growth numbers over last year’s attendance, and conversions. Those are great ways to measure the return on investment for…

God has a way to intersect our lives during the mundane to do something amazing when we least expect. I call these moments “divine appointments.” These are times when God places people, often the unlikely, in an intersecting path with our own, but the result is seldom what we anticipate. It’s usually something truly inspired. Unfortunately, I, for one, too often fail to see these divine appointments for what they are, and let them pass by unaware of their power to change lives, mostly mine. I travel a lot–frankly more than I want to, but it’s necessary to do my job. One of the things I enjoy about flying is the time it affords me to read , to write, or to just nap after a long day (I’m one of the few people who can sleep soundly in a plane). A few months ago I was on a flight…

I have the best job in the world because I love what I do. I have the privilege to working with people whom I believe in, helping them make a difference in our world. A few months ago I got a call from an old friend who sold his business to start a not-for-profit organization. While watching the heart wrenching footage of the devastating tsunami a couple of years back, Wayne saw a pair of shoes wash ashore. Being in the shoe business, he decided to do something about it and began to put shoes in people’s feet that needed them. In a little over two years, Soles 4 Souls, his ministry, has already given over 2 million pair of shoes worldwide. That’s amazing to me. Wayne Elsey challenged me to help Soles 4 Souls to develop a product that would impact people all over the world even more and…